Why every terrorist needs a website

It might dominate Al Jazeera's schedules, but in the propaganda war al Qaeda has made one glaring error: where's the website, guys?

Al Qaeda's lack of a news site is distinctly unfashionable. Most of the West's "pro-scribed terrorist organisations" maintain web pages that let them bypass the media and publish press releases, galleries of "mar-tyrs" and calls to arms, often in English. Only last week, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (www.pflp-pal.org) was boasting of murdering the Israeli minister Rehavam Ze'evi.

"The significant blow delivered by the PFLP military wing to one of the most racist, extremist and Zionist symbols of Sharon's government," it explained, was "a natural reaction to the continuous crimes of the Israeli occupation."

Meanwhile, Hezbollah (www.hizballah.org) was condemning the US airstrikes on Afghanistan as "aggression and terrorism (des igned) to exercise more hegemony over the world". Farther afield, the Tamil Tigers (www.eelam.com) were warning that they would "show (no) mercy to those traitors and thugs who inflict losses on the Tamil community".

Unable to access traditional media, violent political groups have long used the web to raise money, recruit support and justify their attacks. For the Kosovo Liberation Army, this meant a photo gallery showing children allegedly shot by Serbian paramilitaries; today, for Hamas (www.palestine-info.com), it means extending calls for "a jihad until either victory or martydom".

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) even streams a web audio programme, Radio Resistance, to promote its deadly "militant struggle" that recently attracted the IRA's close interest. Both the British Foreign Office and the US State Department maintain lists of proscribed "terrorist groups", which include the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Abu Nidal Organisation, the Kurdistan Workers' Party and the Jewish Kahane Chai group. Yet, most distribute their messages on-line without interference, needing only an internet service provider (ISP) prepared to take their business, and a contact address (often fictitious) for regis-tering the domain name.

"It's up to individual governments to act" against material that incites violence, explains a spokeswoman for ICANN, the international body that regulates internet domains. "We don't condone anything like that, but we don't get involved. Some registrars might choose not to allow a domain such as Ihatebaptistpeople.com; but others will allow hate stuff, just for the money."

Increasingly, governments are taking action to silence extremist groups. Two weeks ago, FBI agents warned an American ISP, HyperVine, that its assets would be seized under anti-terrorist laws unless it closed IRAradio.com. The site, they said, was fundraising for the Real IRA, which in May was listed as a "designated foreign terrorist organisation". Today, the site explains that it has "temporarily shut down", but you can still log on to the 32-County Sovereignty Movement, a political pressure group linked to the Real IRA, at www. geocities. com/ thirtytwocounty.

Many of the sites are secretive about the number of visitors they attract, although the Zapatista Liberation Front in Mexico (www.ezln.org) claims to have had more than a million visits this year. Sites are also reticent to discuss their back-ers. The Tamil Tigers' site, www.eelam.com, is registered to an address in Long Lane, South-wark, but no one there could help, and a contact phone number proved unobtainable.

We traced ownership of Hamas's site (www.palestine-info.com) to the Palestinian Information Centre in Beirut, but the e-mail account of Ziyad Sadaqa, the listed contact, was not accepting messages, and a contact number was not working. Both sites appear to be hosted by companies in the US, where the First Amendment is cited to protect freedom of expression.

"The First Amendment provides protection even for people opposed to the US government, so long as they are not directly inciting physical harm," explains Will Doherty, an activist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which opposes on-line censorship. "At times of crisis like this, a flow of information is vital - particularly so that people can hear the other side's message, and hold our democratic leaders to account."

Others are more concerned that dozens of jihad-related websites feature instructions for making bombs and waging low-level war. "While sites have a right to exist, they don't have the right to spread harmful material unchallenged," insists Gail Gans, director of the Anti-Defamation League's civil-rights information centre. But unless law-enforcement bodies act, there is little the ADL can do. "It's academic to talk about 'sanctions' on the net; there isn't one giant plug you pull out of the wall."

Still, there might just be one sanction that can produce results. Cyber-attacks are proving effective in silencing opponents, at least temporarily, helped by software which crashes the victim's web server by sending it 32,000 e-mails at a time. Last March, hackers defaced the Hamas site and replaced anti-Zionist tirades with pornography.

What, then, of www.taleban. com, the formerly vociferous propaganda site owned by the Afghan Taliban Mission to the UN, that has been strangely inaccessible in recent weeks? Abdul Hackeem Mujahib, listed as its registered contact,was not answering phones yesterday at his New York address, and his e-mail address, admin@taleban.com, offered no response.

Still, the version of the site last recorded by search engine Google offers clues. Osama bin Laden's supporters, it says, are "inhuman vermin", and "revenge and justice will be done" for 11 September. "It shall be a great day when he is dead." Hacked again.